Biography of Amilcare Ponchielli (1834-1886)

Composer and Italian Professor, born in 1834 and died in 1886, which was one of the leading figures in the Group of conservative Italian composers who found his ideal in the central period of the work of Verdioperas.

Completed his studies at the Milan Conservatory, where he later was Professor of composition (among his disciples was Puccini), began his career as an organist in succession of his father. In 1856, he premiered his first opera at teatro Concordia of Cremona, I promessi sposi; five years later came the savoiarda, which then obtained a discreet public acceptance, but it achieved full success in 1872, when he overcame in Milan I promessi sposi. Two years later premiered in this city I Lituani, and in 1876 his masterpiece, La Gioconda. This work, with a libretto by Boito, presents elements of the great French opera mixed with Italian melodrama. Their following two operas, Il figliuol prodigal (1880) and Marion Delorme (1885), they were both premiered at La Scala in Milan and did not get the success of its predecessors.